decline

i'm not in the best mental space tonight. i guess my precipitous mood decline can be traced to my last therapy session on thursday. the funny thing is i've only become aware of the change in mood at this particular moment. it's as if i've just kind of been living life in the interim, racing ahead from one moment until the next until i had this pause just now. and with it the sadness that i guess i'd been doing a good job outpacing caught up to me and overtook my soul.

the session with dr. s actually started out pretty emotion free. i described the denouement of my visit with my mother and then shared about my reaction to that pretty disturbing situation that michael wanted to drag me into (each described here and here). we also talked about my just here feelings (as described here). during the course of the conversation, i realized that while my work life is filled with clear vision of what we are trying to accomplish and defined plans for doing so, my personal life is completely bereft of any sense of direction or real meaning.

i described the feeling as being in a starkly, blindingly white space. i had a similar experience of this white space back in my late 20's -- the last time i was in therapy in fact. it's this dynamic that when i attempt to think about my life, my hopes, my dreams of what i would like it to become, no images come to mind. all i see is me sitting in this white space with no sign of anything anywhere around.

again, i pretty much shared all of this in a dispassionate, almost eerily even, calm way. and then as the session came to a close, dr. s asked me about how the challenging situation with my mother, in which i was not receiving the kind of unconditional love one so desires from a parent, made me feel. and that's when i broke open.

tears welled up in my eyes, and i just shared that it was really difficult. i tried to push away the emotion, but dr. s said it was important that i recognize that i would likely need to grieve this situation. and all at once some images did come to mind. but they weren't of what my life will be but of what it has been. images of how up until my early teens i had viewed home as a safe and welcoming place. and then over time, that perspective began to change with my mother's seemingly increasing criticisms about so much of who i am. i summed up this recognition to dr. s by saying that over time i had come to feel that my mother had transformed from being my advocate into my adversary.

and with that statement i was reminded of something i guess i've realized all along. i lost my "home" pretty early in life. i had a place to live and then return to for holidays and vacations, but my home was gone. and all of my life has been a search for it. for love. for family. for a sense of belonging in a world that i seem so very out of place in. and so much of this blog has been about chronicling that search.

and now i'm in this place again where there is no clear path ahead to what i want my life to become. and i sit and i wonder and i hope that if i cannot find home that maybe god will be merciful and home will find me.